UK National ‘Organ Donation Week’ 4-10 September 2017 – Please Support The Campaign – Sign Up and Register as an Organ Donor Today:

To: All Branches

Dear Colleagues,

Next week is the UK national “Organ Donation Week” and the CWU is once again supporting the week and asking all CWU Reps, Branches and Regions to support the campaign, in line with CWU Conference Policy.

CWU is therefore proudly supporting Organ Donation Week from 4 – 10 September and is encouraging everyone to talk about organ donation.

Over the last year thousands of people have received life-saving or life changing transplants. However hundreds of life-saving transplants are being missed around the country every year because families don’t know what their relative wanted.

The number of people currently known to be alive thanks to organ transplants has broken 50,000 for the first time.

This increase is revealed in this year’s UK Transplant Activity Report 2016/17, published by NHS Blood and Transplant.

There are now 50,300 people alive today thanks to organ transplants – more than enough to fill a Premiership Football Ground. This includes:

The milestone figure has been reached thanks to record levels of public support for organ donation and improvements in survival rates.

The number of people receiving a transplant in a single year has reached the record figure of 4,753, an increase of 20% in the last five years. The increase means that nearly 800 more people a year have their lives saved or improved by transplants than they did five years ago.

The number of people on the NHS Organ Donor Register also reached a record number, 23.6 million, up by 4.9 million over five years. Now, 36% of the UK’s population is on the NHS Organ Donor Register, compared to 30% five years ago.

Survival rates continue to improve. An adult receiving the most common type of kidney transplant during the early 1990s had a 66% chance it would still be functioning after five years. Today’s report shows adults who received the same type of transplant five years ago have an 87% chance their kidney is still functioning today.

Many more recipients are now able to enjoy fuller lives, including starting families of their own.

During the week, NHS Blood and Transplant, hospitals, charities and supporters of organ donation are encouraging people across the UK to talk about organ donation with their relatives and friends.

NHS Blood and Transplant surveys show more than 80% of people support organ donation but only around 41% of people have ever talked about it. Research shows that women are 30% more likely to start a conversation about organ donation than men. It’s simple to register and carry a donor card.

We’re proud to support this lifesaving appeal and it’s really easy for everyone to take part – We want to get this simple message out to our members – just have a chat. That chat might be the next time you sit down for a meal, when you are shopping or working, or when you are just driving in the car. If you want to be a donor, your family’s agreement is still needed for donation to go ahead, even if you are on the NHS Organ Donor Register.

Families who agree to donate say it helps with their grief and that they feel an enormous sense of pride at knowing their relative gave others the chance of a new beginning. An organ donor can save or transform up to nine people’s lives and help even more by donating tissue, such as the donation of sight.

The NHS Blood and Organ Donation and Transplantation Service have expressed their gratitude for the CWU’s support in recent years because hundreds of lives are being lost every year and supporting the campaign for more donors is much needed.

This Organ Donation Week, we want Branches and Reps to ask members to tell their family they want to save lives. A few words now can make an extraordinary difference. If anyone is unsure about donation, they should ask themselves as a family; what would you do if one of you needed a transplant? Would you accept a life-saving organ? If you’d take an organ, shouldn’t you be prepared to donate also?

There is a particular need for more black and Asian people to talk about donation. Patients from ethnic minority communities make up 29% of the national transplant waiting list but people from these communities are less likely to agree to donate. Organs from people from the same ethnic background are more likely to be a close match and give the best chance of a positive outcome and survival.

There are lots of assets available to use in local awareness raising campaigns such as an email signature, web banner and social media assets.

All Organ Donation Week assets are now on the promoting donation hub at:-

A campaign supporter’s link has been set up to use in order to link through to a web page which encourages people to talk about organ donation. They then have the option to join the Organ Donor Register which is what the campaign aims to do – raise awareness – raise the number of registered donors. The link is at:-